Japanese Brisbane Bandits Cards

I got a package in the mail the other day from my friend Steve Smith* in Australia.  Steve was kind enough to send me the cards of the three Japanese players who played for the Brisbane Bandits in this past Australian Baseball League season.

*I should mention here that baseball.com.au recently had an article about Steve and his "mission to collect the baseball card of every Australian who has played professional ball at any point, anywhere in the world".  

Two of the three players - Kyosuke Mashiko and Hayate Nakagawa - were dispatched to Brisbane by the Yokohama DeNA Baystars.  I think this makes them the first active NPB players in the ABL to appear on ABL baseball cards since Kenshi Sugiya in 2018.  (All the other Japanese players on ABL cards since then have been former NPB players.)

The third player is Ryo Kohigashi, who, based on his Facebook profile, used to play for Mitsubishi Motors in the corporate leagues (although I don't know WHICH Mitsubishi Motors team he was with).  Since then he's spent two seasons in North America with the Capitales de Québec of the Frontier League as well as three seasons in Australia (2022-23 with Auckland, 2024-25 with Canberra and 2025-26 with Brisbane).  This is not his first baseball card - he had cards with the Capitales in both 2024 adn 2025.  

All three cards are from the Series 1 card set issued by the Bandits and have identical backs:

Shane, the seller on Ebay that I've previously bought ABL cards from, is selling the complete set so, based on his listing, I can tell you that the set has 13 cards in all with Robbie Perkins probably being the biggest name in the set.

Thanks for the cards, Steve!